Summary

This project is a simple stand-alone Weak Signal Propagation Reporter (WSPR) beacon.  There are boatloads of these projects already floating around in the Ham community, but mostly I'm dong this just to have an opportunity to play with some parts that I have lying around while I have some free time between real-world jobs.  In particular, a Si5351A 'breakout board' which I currently have on-hand for other projects.

Deets

At the urging of my extended family, I took the various Ham tests some months back and became licensed.  I hadn't seriously contemplated Ham before, but it is something of a rite of passage for EE's, so in a way it probably needed to happen.  My intentions in taking the test were to appease my family's urging, and to see if I still remember anything from my school days all those eons ago.  After I took the tests I thought that would be that, but as one might expect the hardware soon after started showing up.  I received some gifted radios, and if I've got them then I guess I should use them.  It was really quite generous, though one thing that was not included was an antenna, and not having such does somewhat diminish the charm of the radio.

I tried making my own antennas a couple times; the first was a disaster, and now I am using a simpler design (and End-Fed Half-Wave Dipole).  I live in the suburbs, so I have all the usual deed restrictions and covenants, so this was a more stealthy option.  After much more climbing in the attic and cutting conduits in ceilings and running coax (and making baluns, and... and...) I was able to erect an antenna that seems to be working.  But how do I know, really?  I don't know CW, and I'm too mike-shy to sit around calling 'CQ' for a phone contact, but digital modes have some appeal for me.

I was originally going to make a Vector Network Analyser (VNA) to qualify my antenna (and future antennae -- I'm sure there will be), but that project has grown in concept to a multi-functional antenna tool.  I don't know if I'll get around to that, but in the course of a shopping spree on eBay, I did pick up some direct-digital synthesizers (DDS).  One is a very popular Silicon Labs part:  the Si5351A.  Really, it's intended to be a crystal oscillator replacement, but because you can have it generate several clock outputs (3 in my case, but some variants have 'up to 8 non-integer-related frequencies from 2.5 kHz to 200 MHz'), and because it's fairly cheap (the breakout board with all support components can be had for about $USD 5 from China) it's a popular part to work with.

So, while I was between jobs, I thought it would be good to use the liberated time to play with the Si5351 part.  The part is popular because it's cheap, but it's actually quite a chore to work with.  It has (up to) 188 registers that have to be programmed to make it do its thing.  If I can get some sort of code working with it, then I can use that later for... something!  It was my intent to use it in the notional VNA project, but that is a bit further out.  So another thing that is antenna related (and I planned to include in my notional 'antenna tool' project) is a thing called the Weak Signal Propagation Reporter (WSPR).

WSPR is a somewhat new digital mode created by a physicist (Joe Taylor) who discovered orbiting Pulsars (and got a Nobel prize for such).  I won't repeat what can easily be found elsewhere:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WSPR_(amateur_radio_software)

But suffice it to say that WSPR is handy for seeing how far the signal from your antenna reaches.  If you were building an antenna, and got it tuned up, then why wouldn't you want to immediately do a quick WSPR and see how far you can be heard?

Next

Planning...